Kibbutz Buchenwald - Survivors and Pioneers (Paperback)

In 1945, after the liberation of concentration camp Buchenwald, 16 young men formed the "Kibbutz Buchenwald", designed to prepare Jews for emigration to Palestine. This is an account of the group, split into two parts. The first part, entitled "The Dream", examines the creation of the kibbutz in Germany until its departure for Palestine in the summer of 1945. The second part, called "The Reality", follows the members of the the kibbutz into Palestine and its establishment as an independent settlement there. This settlement exists as Kibbutz Netzer Sereni today. Baumel's account draws from the diaries of the kibbutz's founding members and places the central narrative in the larger contexts of communal living, European politics after the war, and the link between European Jewry and Israeli postwar nationhood.